Oh my God, God, God.

How could I…?

Oh my God, God, God.

How could I forget about birth control?

Oh my God!

“Circe?” he called on another arm squeeze.

“What?” I whispered.

“Did you hear what I said?”

“Yeah.” I was still whispering.

“You have no response?”

“No, uh… you’re right. Showered with riches, army at her service, adulation, consort to a leader. That all sounds good. Pop would dig all that.”

“Dig?” Diandra asked and I turned distracted eyes to her.

“Like. He’d like that,” I explained, Diandra nodded and translated.

I looked forward.

“She jokes,” Lahn muttered (but Diandra still interpreted).

“No,” I said softly and shook my head once. “No, I’m not joking.

But, the truth is, Pop wouldn’t like that. What he would like is that a man would wish to give his daughter that and that that man would want the same for his daughters.”

Diandra hadn’t finished translating when Lahn’s hand came up making his arm slant at an angle across my chest so his fingers could curve around my neck and he could pull me so my full back was tight against his chest.

“We will make warriors,” he told me quietly, his voice deeper than normal.

Oh God.

“Right,” I whispered.

“But we will make daughters too so I can find them kings who wish to hand them kingdoms.”

Oh fucking God.

“Right,” I repeated on another whisper.

“You have rare beauty the like I have never seen but you will be more beautiful heavy with my seed,” he stated softly.

At his words, my breasts swelled and my head got light both at the same time. The combination was an unusual sensation and one that I did not like.

Oh man, if he didn’t shut up, I was going to pass out.

“I really need to learn the Korwahk language so Diandra doesn’t have to translate conversations like this,” I grumbled, Lahn chuckled then his lips went to my ear.

There, he murmured in my language, “Yes, my Circe, you do.”

I blinked.

Jeez, was he some kind of language savant or what? He was picking up English way faster than I was picking up Korwahk and he only had me and Diandra to listen to.

“You’re freaking me out,” I whispered.

“Sorry, my dear, I didn’t catch that,” Diandra said and I didn’t even have to look at her to know she was fighting back laughter.

And losing.

“He’s freaking me out, um… shocking me, surprising me but in a not so good way. He’s learning our language very fast and it’s not natural.”

“It isn’t surprising that he would pick things up quickly. He meets often with ambassadors, dignitaries and foreigners from many lands.

It is important for him to hear and understand them therefore it is known widely our Dax speaks seven languages fluently, my dear,”

Diandra told me, I whipped around so fast Lahn had to jerk his head back and I stared up at him.

“You speak seven languages?” I breathed, Diandra translated and he nodded so I leaned in and kept breathing, “Seven?”

His eyes roamed my face and one side of his lips twitched before he replied in English, “Yes, Circe, seven.”

“Then why don’t you know English?” I shouted. “I mean, Valearian or whatever!”

He waited for the translation and then Diandra translated his response. “Because it is spoken in Hawkvale and Lunwyn, which are peaceful nations that do not cross the Green Sea to make war or find trouble. And it is spoken in Middleland, which is ruled by a tyrant who I would not honor by learning his language.”

Shit, that made sense. Still, it was annoying.

“Well, unlucky for you that your wife speaks the one language probably in this world that you don’t speak.”

“No,” he replied, “there are many lands too far away to wage war on Korwahk whose languages I do not know. None of them speak

Valearian, which brings me to the question of what small kingdom you are from.”

Uh-oh.

I turned forward, mostly to buy time.

“Circe,” he called then Diandra translated the rest, “look at me.”

I bit my lip and turned back to him.